NHAI plans to award 6,631 km length of roads projects in FY17 worth Rs 85,000 crore. Nearly half of them are expected to be in the hybrid mode while the remaining will use the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) and Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) models.

Under the hybrid model, 40 per cent of the project cost is borne by the government and the remaining by the developer, whichis quite economical as it does not stretch the balance sheet.

A senior analyst with a mutual fund house on the condition of anonymity said, "Developers would not have to shell out higher equity. For a road project worth Rs 5,000 crore, after deducting the government funding of 40 per cent, and considering 80:20 debt-to-equity funding ratio for the remaining 60 per cent portion, a developer shells out just Rs 600 crore worth of equity."

A road project gives revenue visibility of 2-2½ years and with lower funding in case of hybrid projects. Therefore, the number of bidders for hybrid projects has increased to 7-10 per project on an average in May and June from 2-3 in March and April.

Large infrastructure companies are showing lesser inclination to bid as they may not be able to take on more debt without severely stretching their balance sheets.